“Yes, you will.” For a split second, his stare flicked up over her shoulder and he seemed to shake his head as if he were dismissing someone who was out in the hall. “And you will do so as soon as possible.”
Gin twisted around, expecting somebody to be standing behind her on the threshold. No one was there.
She refocused on him. “You’ll have to put a gun to my head.”
“No, I won’t. You’re going to do it on your own, voluntarily.”
“I will not—”
“Yes, you will.”
In the quiet that followed, her heart skipped a number of beats. Over the course of her life, she had learned to both hate and fear her father—and in this tense, air-less silence between them, she wondered not for the first time what he was truly capable of.
“You can choose to fight,” he said smoothly. Or you can be efficient about this. You are only going to hurt yourself if you don’t do this for the family. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to retire for the evening—”
“You can’t treat me like this.” She forced some strength into her voice. “I’m not some corporate executive you can hire and fire, and you can’t order me around, not when it’s going to ruin my life.”
“Your life is already ruined. You had a child at seventeen, here in this house, for godsakes, and have followed that up with the kind of promiscuous behavior typically reserved for Las Vegas strippers. You barely graduated from Sweet Briar due to an affair with your married English professor, and as soon as you moved back here, you slept with my chauffeur. You are a disgrace to this household, and what is worse, I get the distinct impression that part of your enjoyment in these exploits is the embarrassment it causes your mother and me.”
“Maybe if I’d had a good male role model to look up to, I wouldn’t find men so universally unappealing.”
“Would that you found any of them unappealing. That is not your problem, however. For some reason, Richard is undaunted by your reputation, an error in judgment he will no doubt come to regret. Thankfully, that is not my concern.”
“I hate you,” she hissed.
“The sad thing is, my dear, you lack sufficient depth for that level of enmity. If you had any intelligence at all, you’d realize that Richard Pford will be able to keep you in the lifestyle that you require as much as air itself for the rest of your days. And you will be ensuring the further success and financial health of the family who gave you those high cheekbones and lovely peaches and cream complexion. It will be, when all is said and done, the only contribution you will ever make to the name ‘Bradford.’”
Gin was dimly aware of breathing hard. “Someday you’re going to pay for your sins.”
“Are you getting religious now? I would think any kind of conversion for you might be difficult even for the likes of Jesus.”
“How can you be so hateful? I’ve never met anyone as cold as you—”
“I am taking care of you the only way I know how. I’m giving you a fortune at your disposal, a worthy name, and you can even take Amelia with you if you want. Or she can stay here—”
“As if she’s a piece of luggage?” She shook her head. “You are depraved. You are absolutely, clinically depraved—”
He bolted forward and grabbed her arm, for once allowing some emotion to escape that aristocratic mask of self-assurance. “You have no idea what is required to keep this family afloat. None. Your most difficult task day to day is prioritizing whether to get your hair or your nails done first. So do not talk to me about depravity when I am solving a problem for all of the leeches under this roof. Richard Pford’s favorable terms will help us continue to afford this.” He shook the skirt of her gown. “And this—” He jabbed his forefinger at the necklace around her throat. “And all the other things that you take advantage of every day without pausing to reflect, for even an instant, how they are provided to you or at what cost. Marrying that man is the one and only thing that has ever been required of you in exchange for the blind luck of your birth and the freedom of your avarice. You are a Bradford through and through, capable only of consumption, but sometimes payment must be made, so yes,” he spat, “I can assure you that you will become the very happy, very beautiful, and very married Mrs. Richard Pford. You will give him children and be faithful to him, or so help me God, I will spank you like the five-year-old you are. Do we understand each other? Or perhaps you would like a crash course in trying to be like the people who wash your cars, make your food, clean your room, and press your clothes. Perhaps you’d like to know how hard it is to work for a living.”
“I despise you,” she said, shaking from head to foot.
Her father was likewise breathing hard, and he coughed into his fist. “As if I care. Go have your temper tantrum and kick and scream—it will only prove me right. If you are any kind of a woman, instead of a spoiled little brat, you will wake up in the morning and do your duty for once in your life.”
“I could kill you right now!”
“But that would require getting and loading a gun, wouldn’t it. Not exactly something you can ask your maid to do, assuming you don’t want to get caught.”
“Don’t under estimate me—”
“Given the low standard you’ve set for yourself, that would certainly be difficult to do.”
Spinning around, she tripped out of the room, and ran down the hall to her suite. Throwing herself over her threshold, she locked herself in and panted.